Battle of Dunbar (1296)

The Battle of Dunbar (27 April 1296) was the only significant field action in the campaign of 1296 during the Wars of Scottish Independence. The battle saw an invading English army under the Earl of Surrey crush the Scottish army of King John Balliol at Dunbar, forcing King John Balliol to surrender and allow for the English to occupy Scotland.

History
After the sack of Berwick-upon-Tweed, Edward I of England rushed to conquer the rest of Scotland, and his next objective after Berwick was Dunbar Castle. The castle's owner, Patrick IV, Earl of March was English, but his wife was sympathetic to the Scots, and she allowed for the Scots to use it as a base. Edward sent the Earl of Surrey, Balliol's own father-in-law, to invest the stronghold with a large force of knights.

The defenders of Dunbar requested assistance from King John, whose army was encamped at nearby Haddington. The King sent the majority of his army to assist in the relief of Dunbar, leading to a battle between the mounted men-at-arms of both sides. The Scots mistakenly believed that the English were withdrawing from the battlefield as the English knights crossed a gully intersected by the Spott Burn, leading to the Scots launching a disorderly downhill charge against them. However, the English advanced in perfect order, and the Scots were routed in a single charge. About 100 Scottish lords, knights, and men-at-arms were taken prisoner, and one English source claimed that 10,000 Scots died in battle at Dunbar. The day after the battle, King Edward appeared in person, and Dunbar Castle surrendered.

The battle ended the war between England and Scotland, with the fortress of Roxburgh surrendering without a fight. Only Edinburgh Castle held out for a week against Edward's siege engines, and John reached Perth on 21 June, where he received messages from Edward asking for peace. John and his son Edward Balliol were sent into English captivity, and John's vestments of royalty were stripped from him, while the Stone of Scone and other relics of Scottish nationhood were taken back to London by King Edward.